MOBILE, Alabama — Classes resumed this week at McGill-Toolen Catholic High School in Midtown Mobile, and as usual the senior class was easy to spot in the crowded hallways, since they are the only students permitted to wear the school’s traditional black shirt.
Small privileges, big meaning
For seniors who spent three years working toward the milestone, the black shirt carries real weight. One student, who moved to Mobile from Indiana and joined the school as a sophomore, said she was most looking forward to the small senior privileges tied to good behavior, like skipping ahead in the lunch line, even though she still has to make up a freshman-level course she missed when she arrived.
Active in hospital volunteer work through a University of South Alabama children’s program, she hopes to study nursing at Purdue University and take part in a study-abroad program there. Her route to McGill-Toolen — a mid-high school move across several states — is one a number of Mobile families know well, as the city’s defense, aerospace, healthcare and shipbuilding employers draw new households to the area every summer and the school’s reputation draws their teenagers.
Student government, pep rallies and college indecision
Another senior, elected president of the student government association, said his year will be built around pep rallies and his duties as tailgating president for football games, while he juggles keeping his GPA up for scholarship consideration. He has toured several in-state and regional universities but remains undecided on where he will study medicine or law, saying he ultimately hopes to go into politics.
His portfolio of responsibilities captures the peculiar workload of a McGill-Toolen senior: leading the student body’s elected government, organizing the pregame rituals that rally the school behind its Yellow Jackets, and holding the grades that keep college money on the table. For students aiming at competitive universities and professional schools, senior year is both a celebration and a test.
The ‘Back in Black’ pep rally and a packed resume
A third senior, who leads a hospital volunteer group and serves as vice president of her class, said the highlight of her year will be the school’s Back in Black pep rally, when the hallways are draped entirely in the class color. She is weighing offers from two in-state universities to study management information systems, though she admits the ACT and looming college applications feel overwhelming. Her advice to freshmen was simple: keep a level head, and don’t sprint through the halls.
Her calendar reflects the kind of résumé today’s college applicants assemble: leadership in her class, service organizing at a Mobile hospital, standardized testing and applications, all while carrying a full course load. The Back in Black pep rally, a beloved tradition that turns the school over to the senior class for a day, is the moment she and her classmates are counting down toward.
Common advice across the senior class
Despite their different interests and college plans, the seniors shared a remarkably consistent message for the underclassmen: take the small things seriously, because the traditions are what make the years memorable, and do not wish the high school years away. They described their own class as one that learned that lesson the hard way, watching upperclassmen before them and wishing they had gotten involved sooner.
The black shirt that sets seniors apart is only the most visible piece of the tradition. It signals a class that has moved from the back of the line to the front, from learning the school’s customs to running them — planning the pep rallies, leading the student government and showing the freshmen how things are done at the Catholic school that has educated Mobile’s young people for generations.
A Tradition Decades in the Making
McGill-Toolen’s senior traditions grew out of a school with deep roots in Mobile. The campus in Midtown traces its history through two predecessor institutions — the old McGill Institute for boys and Bishop Toolen High School for girls — which were combined in the early 1970s to form the coeducational school that today anchors Catholic education in the city. Operated under the Archdiocese of Mobile, the school draws students from across Mobile and Baldwin counties, with graduates who have gone on to Auburn, Alabama and colleges far beyond the Gulf Coast.
Traditions like the black shirt and the Back in Black pep rally serve a purpose beyond nostalgia in a school of that size. They mark the senior class as leaders, give underclassmen visible milestones to work toward, and knit together classes that came up through different middle schools into a single class identity by senior year. Faculty and administrators at Catholic high schools often point to those rituals as part of the formation the schools promise families — lessons in responsibility and community that sit alongside the academic curriculum.
The College Crunch Behind the Celebrations
Behind the pep rallies, McGill-Toolen seniors are navigating the same college admissions landscape that confronts students across Alabama, and the conversations in the hallways this week made that clear. ACT sittings, application deadlines, scholarship requirements and university tours crowd the fall calendar, and students balancing leadership roles with coursework describe the pressure in blunt terms. Guidance counselors at the school work with seniors on applications and financial aid, while teachers of advanced coursework see the workload compound during the first semester.
For students pursuing competitive fields — nursing, medicine, law, engineering, information systems — the senior year GPA matters for scholarships and admissions alike, which is why so many of the class leaders described their year as a balancing act. The school’s college-preparatory curriculum is designed for exactly that push, and its graduates’ placement in universities across the Southeast is a point of pride the school publicizes each spring.
Service at the Center of Senior Year
The volunteering that threads through the seniors’ stories — hospital work through a University of South Alabama children’s program, organized service groups — reflects the emphasis on community service that Catholic education builds into its expectations. Mobile’s hospitals and children’s programs rely heavily on student volunteers, and for students eyeing healthcare careers, the experience doubles as an early look at the profession they hope to join. Service hours accumulate on résumés, but students and teachers alike describe the work as formative rather than transactional: seniors who spend afternoons with young patients frequently say the experience redirected their college and career plans.
As the year unfolds, the class of seniors in black shirts will move from the first-day-of-school excitement through Friday night games, service projects, exams and, finally, the Back in Black celebration that caps their time on the Midtown campus. If their own advice holds — keep a level head, don’t sprint through the halls — they intend to make it last.
Friday Nights and the Yellow Jacket Calendar
Football anchors the social calendar at McGill-Toolen the way it does at high schools across Alabama, and the senior class sits at the center of it. The tailgating president’s job — organizing the pregame gatherings that bring families and alumni together before kickoff — is one of the class’s signature duties, and pep rallies build the week’s energy toward Friday night. The school’s teams compete in the state’s highest classification, and games against rivals from across Mobile and Baldwin counties draw crowds that fill the stands with students in school colors, alumni and the parish communities that feed the school.
Senior privileges extend beyond the shirt and the lunch line. Class officers run meetings, seniors hold the leadership posts in clubs and service organizations, and the year’s signature events — from the Back in Black rally to senior retreats and, in the spring, graduation at the Cathedral or the school’s own ceremonies — are staged, planned and led by the class itself. It is an apprenticeship in event leadership that many students say shaped their college plans as much as any course did.
What the New School Year Holds
The week’s first days set the tone. New students found their lockers and learned the campus layout, freshmen discovered that the legends about sprinting seniors are true, and the class in black shirts stepped into the roles they had watched from the back of the hallway for three years. Teachers spent the opening days setting expectations for a year that will move quickly — first quarter grades arrive before the community has settled into autumn, and college deadlines follow close behind.
For the seniors profiled in the hallways this week, the road ahead runs from pep rallies and volunteer shifts through the ACT, applications and, eventually, decisions about Purdue, in-state universities and the rest. Their advice to the freshmen trailing behind them carries the weight of having just made the climb themselves: work hard, get involved, mind the traditions, and keep a level head. The black shirts, after all, are only borrowed for a year — but what a class does with the year is what the school remembers.